The Chernoramenskoye Forests are a historic forested area to the west of the Kerzhenets River, located in Semyonovsky Uyezd of Nizhny Novgorod Governorate. They formed part of the Old Believer skete settlement zone alongside the Kerzhenets forests and constituted a unified skete district within the Nizhny Novgorod Zavolzhye.

Role in Old Believer Settlement

In the 17th–19th centuries, Zavolzhye — including the basins of the Kerzhenets, Uzola, Linda rivers and their tributaries — became the principal refuge for Old Believers seeking shelter in remote forested areas. The first Old Believer sketes in the Kerzhenets and Chernoramenskoye forests appeared in the 1660s–1680s, near the villages of Larionovo, Trunovo, and Demyanovo, where followers of the "old faith" fled to escape the Nikonian reforms.[3][1] The Chernoramenskoye forests formed the western part of this cluster of sketes: it was here that the Sharpan and Ulanger sketes stood — among the best-known centers of the "old faith" in the region. In the early 18th century, the Chernoramenskoye forests served as a refuge for prominent schismatic teachers: in 1703, Deacon Alexander from Nerekha came here, spent about a year in the skete of Elder Iona, and later founded the "Dyakonovtsy" (Novokadilichniki) concord.[4] Following the provincial reform of 1778–1779, these lands became part of Semyonovsky Uyezd of Nizhny Novgorod Namestnichestvo (from 1796 — Nizhny Novgorod Governorate).[1]

Komarovsky Skete on the Kerzhenets River and other sketes that existed in the Kerzhenets and Chernoramenskoye forests of Semyonovsky Uyezd survived Pitirim's Devastation, the persecutions of the 1850s under Nicholas II, and were finally abolished in the 1930s.

Study of Memorial Sites

In 1995, the Institute of Regional Historical and Social Cultures (IRiSK), commissioned by the Committee for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Heritage of Nizhny Novgorod Region, conducted a study of memorial sites in the Kerzhenets forests with the aim of placing the sites under state protection. Among those studied were the locations of former sketes, skete burial grounds, chapels and grave complexes, holy springs known from Old Believer synodica, archival materials, and the recollections of local residents. At the Old Believer assembly in Moscow in 1779–1780, the question was discussed "concerning the relics of schismatic saints on the Kerzhenets, i.e. in Semyonovsky Uyezd": many figures from the earliest days of the schism were recognized as saints, and their burial sites as miracle-working shrines; among the venerated places are the so-called "Sorokin Graves" of the nun-schematics Agafya and Paraskeva and the monk-schematic Nikodim, in the forest near the village of Larionovo in Semyonovsky District, which were still visited by local Old Believers in the 1990s.[3][2]

On the eve of "Pitirim's Persecution," in 1719, there were 94 sketes operating in Nizhny Novgorod Governorate; after the devastations of 1737, only the remnants of the Sharpansky and Olenevsky sketes survived, while in the places of the rest only cemeteries remained, with the graves of the first ascetics of the Old Belief, which served as pilgrimage sites.[3]

Sources

  1. irisk.me — The first Old Believer sketes in the Kerzhenets and Chernoramenskoye forests appeared in the 1660s–1680s — near the villages of Larionovo, Trunovo, and Demyanovo, where adherents
  2. ru.wikisource.org — The Chernoramenskoye forests in the early eighteenth century served as a refuge for prominent schismatic teachers: in 1703 deacon Alexander from Nerekha came here, having lived in the skete as an elder
  1. pravenc.ru — KERZHENETS (archive)
  2. irisk.me — Kerzhenets sketes
Materials from articles used (2)

In the Forests and On the Mountains, Old Belief in the Nizhny Novgorod Region